


remember yesterday

by ttamarrindo



Series: faraway, so close [2]
Category: Day6 (Band)
Genre: Again, Light Angst, M/M, Time Loop, supplementary story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-09
Updated: 2018-02-09
Packaged: 2019-03-16 01:03:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13625268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ttamarrindo/pseuds/ttamarrindo
Summary: jae is running - has been running - ever since that last yesterday.(alt: time begins to turn.)





	remember yesterday

**Author's Note:**

> **this is not a sequel nor a continuation** but it won’t make much sense if you haven’t read the first part. tomorrow’s ending was the true one and this is purely selfish writing. i’m afraid this may take away from the main story, which i would have left as it is if only i had more self control when it comes to writing, so feel free not to read this. i see this as one of the many outcomes possible once time begins to turn again but it is not, in any way, the only one.

last things first. it goes like this:

 

  
*

 

  
“hyung, are you alright?”

 

wheezing from running all the way from the station down to the café, jae takes a breath that feels like drowning. his guitar is heavy on his back and it pushes down on him like gravity. hands on his knees and heart on his throat beating beating beating he looks up at dowoon and says,

 

“he doesn’t remember.”

 

  
*

 

  
time, jae thinks, is a funny thing. waking up to a thursday after an endless replay of wednesdays was not expected but not that surprising. life has to go on, after all.

 

(but then: “brian, it’s me.” “i - i’m sorry i think you have the wrong person. i don’t - i don’t know you.” )

 

life goes on.

 

no one ever told him it could leave jae behind, though. and time, jae thinks, is mostly just cruel.

 

  
*

 

  
the whole story comes spilling out of him before jae can stop it. he’s two parts drunk and one part bonetired. as a whole? he’s just aching. dowoon was kind enough to ask another barista to cover his shift at the café so he could be here: the two of them with their backs against their creaky living room couch, facing the broken window where the sky is starting to tint the world black.

 

“so that time, the one you didn’t get on the train, it broke the uh, the-”

 

“loop, yes.” with his head on dowoon’s shoulders and the world on his own, jae says, “but now i’m stuck again, only this time is thursday and brian’s not - he doesn’t -”

 

“he doesn’t remember you,” dowoon finishes for him. jae doesn’t know if he believes him or not, if dowoon thinks all this heartache true, but he swallows back the words he couldn’t say and corrects, “he doesn’t remember us.”

 

  
*

 

  
the first loop, the true loop - it didn’t feel like this.

 

it was easy to fall in love with brian, so easy he didn’t notice it happening until he had three pages full of lyrics and a heart full of song that had one name on it, a name shaped liked everyday, shaped like maybe and please don’t forget.

 

there are no stops this time around, the lights don’t flicker and most of all: he is alone.

 

jae climbs on the train again again again and watches brian highlight passages on his business textbook and sneak glances at jae’s guitar that ask more than yearn and jae wishes often, always, that brian would ask for him.

 

but he doesn’t. today becomes today becomes today and not one of them does brian remember. and jae tries because this brian is not his brian, is really just a constant reminder of all that he lost, all their stolen everydays. he tries because love for them was easily won but keeping it is another matter entirely and jae is not ready to let brian forget.

 

so: “hey,” jae says, and hopes.

 

and: “hey,” brian answers, and jae tries again.

 

  
*

 

  
jae is running - has been running - ever since that last yesterday.

 

trying to catch up to time is chasing memories they never made and regretting all the words he never said. there are three he regrets the most.

 

  
*

 

  
“maybe you just need him to fall in love with you again.”

 

jae blinks at dowoon, mug of coffee still raised up to his lips. around them, the café is bustling with noise and chatter and jae feels numb with it all. this time around, brian had dropped his books and when jae had gone to help him pick them up his shirt sleeve had ridden up and oh, empty space where four words once were, yesterday.

 

dowoon takes a seat next to him on the two-person table and sets his rag down.

 

fifteen loops in and jae’s learned it’s better to give dowoon time to process. he corners him in the café right when the younger’s shift is about to start and then leaves to sit at a table and watch as dowoon works through the whole story with furrowed brows and a determined set to his mouth. he doesn’t always believe him, often doesn’t, but he never questions it either and jae is grateful. knowing time isn’t turning like it should and being the only one aware of it is rough; it crawls up his spine and settles on his throat, scares him something awful, too because the loop isn’t breaking.

 

jae knows, he tried . the second replay, after he realised brian was living in today and jae was still stuck thinking of yesterday, he tried to break free. he let the train go, watched it take brian away and hoped it’d bring him back. but the next day he still woke up to a thursday.

 

again again again.

 

“how’s that supposed to happen?” jae snorts and it sounds so defeated dowoon doesn’t bother calling him out for it.

 

“i mean,” dowoon fiddles with his rag. looks at jae. looks away. “i mean, you told me that before the loop broke you were going to, uh, to tell him you loved him, right? because you hadn’t said it to each other before,” and he sounds so embarrassed just saying the word that it takes jae a moment to understand. “so, maybe - maybe you just need to fix that.”

 

“maybe,” jae says. fix yesterday’s mistakes and hope time will turn today into tomorrow.

 

maybe.

 

  
*

 

  
getting brian to fall in love with him in a day sounds tough but jae is hopeful. he keeps brian-sized thoughts inside his heart and he remembers every detail like he remembers the notes in a song he never wrote.

 

so he tries.

 

  
*

 

  
it goes like this:

 

“here.” the lights of the underground are blurring together as the train speeds away but it’s just enough for brian to see the blue highlighter in jae’s palm. “for you,” jae adds when brian just stares.

 

“uh, thanks?” brian mumbles and it sounds like a question but his fingers, although hesitant and unsure, wrap around the highlighter either way. “do i - do i know you?” he asks.

 

“no,” jae answers and tries for a smile. means: you used to .

 

hopes even more: you will again.

 

  
*

 

  
and this:

 

“hey can you please help me out real quick?”

 

brian looks up from his textbook and falters visibly. jae fights down the urge to run his fingers through his hair and instead lets them linger on brian’s own when he passes him the ipod.

 

“i got a project for my music composition class,” jae spins the lie as he sits down next to brian and pretends it doesn’t hurt to see him act so hesitant around him. “and i’ve been having trouble with the second verse. could you listen to it and tell me what you think?”

 

brian’s voice is colored grey when he says, “i, uh, i’m not a musician,” and that’s half right, half wrong, because brian has a musician's heart but he won’t let it beat. not just yet.

 

“it’s okay, i don’t need much. just tell me how you like it.” jae presses play before brian can say much else. brian hurries to put the earbuds in and then quiets - listens.

 

smiles.

 

and it’s shaped a lot like regret.

 

  
*

 

  
this, also:

 

“will that be all?”

 

“can i get your number too?”

 

brian blanches at the question. his eyes widen in surprise, jaw hanging slightly open, he gives jae a once over and says over the cash register, “you’re the guy. from the train.”

 

“i’m hoping to be more than that,” jae smiles and tells himself it doesn’t hurt. “so, what do you say, up for a date?”

 

brian hesitates (it doesn't hurt), shakes his head softly, apologetically (it doesn’t hurt), says, “i - you seem like a nice guy and i would, really, but school’s got me real busy lately.”

 

“it’s okay. don’t sweat it,” jae shrugs (it doesn’t hurt). “just thought i’d try my luck.” he laughs a half-sound but choked as it is, it still rings too loud and far too empty in the silence of the corner store.

 

“sorry,” brian says again before he waves an awkward goodbye and goes bag to manning the register.

 

“some other time. maybe,” jae says, knows brian isn’t listening.

 

(it doesn’t hurt.)

 

  
*

 

  
“have you tried just - kissing him?”

 

“are you out of your mind?” dowoon draws back at the tone of jae’s voice - angry. sad. desperate, too. “he doesn’t know me. i can’t just go up and kiss him like that. besides, we never - i mean, before - we never-”

 

“it’s just a thought,” dowoon defends. he seems to believe jae this time around. he’s oddly determined to help him, too. “a kiss always seems to make things better.”

 

“don’t be such a kid, that doesn’t happen in real life.”

 

“yeah, well,” dowoon shrugs. “neither do time loops.”

 

  
*

 

  
it’s a bad idea all around but when jae sees brian on the train the next same day he thinks three things:

 

one, as he steps closer to brian and sets his guitar down, as he gives a tug on brian’s sleeve and his heart starts at half-pound, he thinks, when midnight comes this will never have happened, when midnight comes time will erase me again. tomorrow, this won’t matter because you’ll forget.

 

two, as brian looks confused and jae smiles two parts scared one part sad but entirely yours, always yours, he thinks, we never kissed in yesterday, never got to say goodbye, but today it will be different and we’ll start at hello.

 

and three, as his lips brush against brian’s and he tastes a finally on his tongue, as brian - doesn’t pull away, instead seems to fall against jae like they fell yesterday, he thinks, if it means having this, if it means having you , i’d let time take all my tomorrows away.

 

  
*

 

  
“did it work?”

 

“what do you think? i’m still here, aren’t i?”

 

  
*

 

  
the next same day after jae can’t stop brushing his fingertips over his lips. he knows midnight erased all trace of brian on his skin but jae loves him so much he still feels branded with it.

 

the next same day after their first kiss which was also their last also their only jae cries as the wagon rattles forward and can’t find it in himself to stop.

 

“here.” there is a familiar hand holding a tissue out for him to take. jae blinks and accepts it with trembling fingers, sees green highlighter slashing bright across a wrist where one truth, their truth, was written just a few yesterdays ago.

 

jae mumbles what should be a thank you yet sounds too much like a please to be quite it.

 

“i don’t pretend to know why you’re sad,” brian says and he is kind and he is careful and he is everything jae fell in love with. everything he could be, if only time would let him. “but i hope that whatever is going on with you eases soon.”

 

the train stops. the doors open. just when brian is about to step out, jae calls out to him and it is a song made promise.

 

“brian.”

 

brian turns to look at him and looks - startled, confused. jae shouldn’t know his name but how can he forget? some days jae thinks it would have been easier that way: if time had erased brian from memory and heart then this cloud of grey regret wouldn’t have been gripping at his throat like it is, wouldn’t be threatening to sink him down everytime midnight comes again.

 

(“do you regret?” dowoon had asked once. “do you regret falling in love with him?”)

 

standing by the sliding doors brian looks like a future-maybe and a never-past.

 

“i love you,” jae says and means it like he has meant every song he’s ever played. means it, too, like the one song they never got to sing.

 

brian opens his mouth to say - something. but the doors slide shut before jae can hear a word.

 

the train starts to move.

 

  
*

 

  
(“no. i don’t think i ever could.”)

 

 

*

 

  
one thursday, it goes like this:

 

jae, sitting in the wagon with nothing but his guitar and the two pieces of his heart, hears more than sees brian takes a seat next to him and say,

 

“hey.”

 

  
*

 

  
time passes but doesn’t turn.

 

but jae will try again. “hey,” is a good a start as any and even if all tomorrow brings is another empty beginning, jae will try again.

 

one more day.

 

  
*

 

everyday.

 

  
*

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> i'm sorry this didn't, uh, fix anything ;;; feel free to come yell at me on [tumblr](https://jahehyung.tumblr.com/) and/or [cc](https://curiouscat.me/ttamarrindo)!


End file.
